Tuesday, 29 November 2011

Finish every day and be done with it. You have done what you could; some blunders and absurdities crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day; you shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.

To dream about anything that you want to dream, that is the beauty of the human mind. To do anything that you want to do, that is the strength of human will. To trust yourself to test your limits, that is the courage to succeed.

In our course through life we shall meet the people who are coming to meet us, from many strange places and by many strange roads and what it is set to us to do to them, and what it is set to them to do to us, will be done.

Saturday, 26 November 2011

It’s good to be just plain happy; it’s a little better to know that you’re happy; but to understand that you’re happy and to know why and how and still be happy, be happy in the being and the knowing, well that is beyond happiness, that is bliss. - Henry Miller

The way to happiness: keep your heart free from hate, your mind from worry. Live simply, expect little, give much. Fill your life with love. Scatter sunshine. Forget self, think of others. Do as you would be done by. Try this for a week and you will be surprised. - Norman Vincent Peale

True happiness is of a retired nature, and an enemy to pomp and noise; it arises, in the first place, from the enjoyment of one’s self, and in the next from the friendship and conversation of a few select companions. - Joseph Addison

Friday, 25 November 2011

A belief is not an idea held by the mind, it is an idea that holds the
mind. - Elly Roselle

Because one believes in oneself, one doesn’t try to
convince others. Because one is content with oneself, one doesn’t need others’
approval. Because one accepts oneself, the whole world accepts him or
her. - Lao Tzu

Belief gets in
the way of learning. - Robert Heinlein

Beliefs have the power to create and the power to
destroy. Human beings have the awesome ability to take any experience of their
lives and create a meaning that disempowers them or one that can literally save
their lives. - Anthony Robbins

Belief is the
ignition switch that gets you off the launching pad. - Denis Waitley

Every man prefers belief to the
exercise of judgment. -Seneca

I think it's better to have ideas. You can change
an idea. Changing a belief is trickier. Life should be malleable and
progressive; working from idea to idea permits that. Beliefs anchor you to
certain points and limit growth; new ideas can't generate. Life becomes
stagnant. - Rufus

I would never die for my beliefs
because I might be wrong. - Bertrand Russell

If you don’t have solid beliefs, you cannot
build a stable life. Beliefs are like the foundation of a building, and they
are the foundation to build

your life upon. - Alfred
Montapert

It is hard to let old beliefs go. They are
familiar. We are comfortable with them and have spent years building systems
and developing habits that depend on them. Like a man who has worn
eyeglasses so long that he forgets he has them on, we forget that the world
looks to us the way it does because we have become used to seeing it
that way through a particular set of lenses. - Kenichi Ohmae

It is okay to stand firm in your
beliefs; just do not impose them on others who may be equally resolute in theirs.
- Unknown

It’s
the repetition of affirmations that leads to belief. And once that belief
becomes a deep conviction, things begin to happen. - Muhammad
Ali

It's an indulgence to sit in a
room and discuss your beliefs as if they were a juicy piece of gossip. - Robert
Heinlein

Man is made by
his belief. As he believes, so he becomes. - Bhagavad Gita

Man often becomes what he believes himself to be.
If I keep on saying to myself that I cannot do a certain thing, it is possible
that I may end by really becoming incapable of doing it. On the contrary, if I
have the belief that I can do it, I shall surely acquire the capacity to do it
even if I may not have it at the beginning. - Mahatma Gandhi

Our belief at
the beginning of a doubtful undertaking is the one thing that insures the
successful outcome of our venture. - William James

The lack of belief is a defect
that ought to be concealed when it cannot be overcome. - Lillian Smith

The less depth a belief system has, the greater the
fervency with which its adherents embrace it. The most vociferous, the most
fanatical are those whose cobbled faith is founded on the shakiest grounds.
- Dean Koontz

There is a force that controls all your decisions.
It influences how you think and feel every moment you're alive. It determines
what you will do and what you will not do. It determines how you feel about
anything that occurs in your life. That force is your beliefs. - Anthony
Robbins

There’s
nothing that can help you understand your beliefs more than trying to explain
them to an inquisitive child. - Frank A. Clark

We may not respect all the beliefs
of others, but we should respect their right of having them. - Validivar

With most men, unbelief in one thing springs from blind belief in
another. - Georg C. Lichtenberg

You can have anything you want if
you will give up the belief that you can't have it. - Dr. Robert Anthony

Wednesday, 23 November 2011

Finally, an article on Running by researchers who have no financial ties to running programmes or shoe manufacturers. At the end of the day, it’s all just common sense. Listen to what your body is telling you, not the shoe manufacturers, who want you to buy their products.

New York: Exercise researchers believe advice about running has become unnecessarily complicated as ‘experts’ battle over shoes and running form and training programmes.

Researchers who have no financial ties to running programmes or shoe manufacturers say that most of those complications are unnecessary and some advice is even risk because it can make running harder and increase the chance of injury.

Take, for example, the notion that there is a perfect running form, like striking the ground with the midfoot or or forefoot. There is no convincing evidence for this convoluted advice, disinterested researchers say.

In fact, studies have found that individuals automatically run in a way that is most efficient for their own bodies. Those who change the way they run naturally are less efficient and more prone to injury.

“There is good evidence that your body is exquisitely lazy and will find he easiest way for you to run,” said Carl Foster, professor of exercise and sports medicine at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse.

Dr Steef Bredeweg of the University Medical Center Groningen,in the Netherlands, and his colleague Dr Ida Buist are principal investigators in a series of rigorous studies of runners, asking how best train novices and how to prevent injuries.

When it comes to running form, Dr Bredeweg sais: “We don’t know what is the right thing to do.”

For example, he noted, forefoot strikers place less stress on their knees but more on their calves and Achilles tendons.

“We tell people we don’t know a thing about the best technique,” h said, telling runners to use the fore they naturally adopt.

Running form is just one example of the confusion buffeting beginners. Running, said John Raglin, professor of kinesiology at Indiana University, “is so prone to these sort of trends.”

People will latch on to anything, he added, and an anecdote or two about what is supposed to be an ideal running form often passes for evidence.

Exercise researchers also say there is no perfect programme to get people started on running.

A lot depends on what a person’s goals are and how fit he or she is before starting to run. Experts caution, though, that it is important to start slowly, increase distance and effort gradually and not become a slave to a rigorous programme.

Dr Raglin said: “People are indoctrinated with what they can achieve in a short time with a little bit of work. But the reality is very different.”

So, if a training programme does not seem to be working, he said, “don’t stick with it because you think it’s what you have to do.”

Tuesday, 22 November 2011

Challenges in life come in three broad categories: easy, difficult, and impossible. Those who take on the easy have a safe and boring life. Those who take on the difficult have a tough but satisfying life. Those who take on the impossible are remembered for life.- Unknown

When life seems chaotic, you don’t need people giving you easy answers or cheap promises. There might not be any answers to your problems. What you need is a safe place where you can bounce with people who have taken some bad hops of their own. - Unknown

A little more patience, a little more charity for all, a little more devotion, a little more love; with less bowing down to the past; brave looking forward to the future with more faith in our fellows, and the race will be ripe for a great burst of light and life. - Unknown

Monday, 21 November 2011

Law of Mechanical Repair - After your hands become coated with grease, your nose will begin to itch and you'll have to pee.

Law of Gravity - Any tool, nut, bolt, screw, when dropped, will roll to the least accessible corner.

Law of Probability - The probability of being watched is directly proportional to the stupidity of your act.

Law of Random Numbers - If you dial a wrong number, you never get a busy signal and someone always answers.

Variation Law - If you change lines (or traffic lanes), the one you were in will always move faster than the one you are in now (works every time, even in the supermarket).

Law of the Bath - When the body is fully immersed in water, the telephone rings.

Law of Close Encounters - The probability of meeting someone you know increases dramatically when you are with someone you don't want to be seen with.

Law of the Result - When you try to prove to someone that a machine won't work, it will.

Law of Biomechanics - The severity of the itch is inversely proportional to the reach.

Law of the Theatre & Hockey Arena - At any event, the people whose seats are furthest from the aisle, always arrive last. They are the ones who will leave their seats several times to go for food, beer, or the toilet and who leave early before the end of the performance or the game is over. The folks in the aisle seats come early, never move once, have long gangly legs or big bellies and stay to the bitter end of the performance. The aisle people also are very surly folk.

The Coffee Law - As soon as you sit down to a cup of hot coffee, your boss will ask you to do something which will last until the coffee is cold.

Murphy's Law of Lockers - If there are only 2 people in a locker room, they will have adjacent lockers.

Law of Physical Surfaces - The chances of an open-faced jelly sandwich landing face down on a floor, are directly correlated to the newness and cost of the carpet or rug.

Law of Logical Argument - Anything is possible if you don't know what you are talking about.

Brown's Law of Physical Appearance - If the clothes fit, they're ugly.

Wilson's Law of Commercial Marketing Strategy - As soon as you find a product that you really like, they will stop making it.

Doctors' Law - If you don't feel well, make an appointment to go to the doctor, by the time you get there you'll feel better.. But don't make an appointment, and you'll stay sick.

Inverse Square Law - All of the above will be rendered invalid or fail at the most ridiculous time.

Sunday, 20 November 2011

The purpose of life is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make some difference that you have lived and lived well. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Having the opportunity to talk about one’s life, to give an account of it, to interpret it, is integral to leading that life rather than being led through it. - Lugones and Spelman

I should have no objection to go over the same life from its beginning to the end: requesting only the advantage authors have, of correcting in a second edition, the faults of the first. - Benjamin Franklin

Your life will be no better than the plans you make, and the action you take. You are the architect and builder of your own life, fortune, and destiny. - Alfred Montapert

Even as a coin attains its full value when it is spent, so life attains its supreme value when one knows how to forfeit it with grace when the time comes. - Felix Marti-Ibanez

Living is a form of not being sure, not knowing what next or how. We guess. We may be wrong, but we take leap after leap in the dark. - Agnes de Mille

Slow down and enjoy life. It’s not only the scenery you miss by going too fast – you also miss the sense of where you are going and why. - Eddie Cantor

Let us live while we live, and snatch each fleeting moment of truth and love and beauty. - Sarah Alden Bradford Ripley

Saturday, 19 November 2011

Love is something eternal – the aspects may change, but not the essence. There is the same difference in a person before and after he is in love as there is in an unlighted lamp and one that is burning. The lamp was there and it is a good lamp, but now it is shedding light, too, and that is its real function. - Vincent van Gogh

Around us lies the world. Pass out into it with hatred in your heart and, by the operation of a law as immutable as that of gravity, you will encounter strife, bitterness, and shame. Pass out into the same world with love in your hear, love everything you meet, no matter how degraded it may appear, or how far removed from the possibility of love, let your love rest upon all, even as the sun touches everything with the infinite charity of its beams, and all the world will blossom like a rose. What need has the world but love? If love were a living thing in the heart of every man, what use were the laws written in statue books? Heaven's only law is love. - Unknown

When you love somebody, you should follow your heart. Sometimes when you are with the person you love the most, you feel confused. You don’t know who you are or what you want but that is totally understandable. It is natural to let go of a part of yourself to be with that person but the important part is that you don’t lose your own identity in the process! - Unknown

Thursday, 17 November 2011

The sublime and the ridiculous are often so nearly related, that it is difficult to class them separately. One step above the sublime makes the ridiculous, and one step above the ridiculous makes the sublime again. - Thomas Paine

Indeed, what is there that does not appear marvellous when it comes to our knowledge for the first time? How many things, too, are looked upon as quite impossible until they have been actually effected? - Pliny The Elder

The two most precious things this side of the grave are our reputation and our life. But it is to be lamented that the most contemptible whisper may deprive us of the one, and the weakest weapon of the other. - Charles Colton

One of the best ways to educate our hearts is to look at our interaction with other people, because our relationships with others are fundamentally a reflection of our relationship with ourselves. - Stephen R. Covey

Be not too presumptuously sure in any business; for things of this world depend on such a train of unseen chances that if it were in man’s hands to set the tables, still he would not be certain to win the game. - George Herbert

Whoever, in middle age, attempts to realize the wishes and hopes of his early youth, invariably deceives himself. Each ten years of a man's life has its own fortunes, its own hopes, its own desires. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The world is never quiet, even its silence eternally resounds with the same notes, in vibrations which escape our ears. As for those that we perceive, they carry sounds to us, occasionally a chord, never a melody. - Albert Camus

Let it be your constant method to look into the design of people’s actions, and see what they would be at, as often as it is practicable; and to make this custom the more significant, practice it first upon yourself. - Marcus Aurelius

Wednesday, 16 November 2011

Two people have been living in you all your life. One is the ego, garrulous, demanding, hysterical, calculating; the other is the hidden spiritual being, whose still voice of wisdom you have only rarely heard or attended to. . . . Because he or she knows you through and through, since he or she is you, your guide can help you, with increasing clarity and humour, negotiate all the difficulties of your thoughts and emotions. . . . The more often you listen to this wise guide, the more easily you will be able to change your negative moods yourself, see through them, and even laugh at them for the absurd dramas and ridiculous illusions that they are. . . . The more you listen, the more guidance you will receive. If you follow the voice of your wise guide . . . and let the ego fall silent, you come to experience that presence of wisdom and joy and bliss that you really are. - Sogyal Rinpoche

When you realize the nature of mind, layers of confusion peel away. You don't actually "become" a Buddha, you simply cease, slowly, to be deluded. And being a Buddha is not being some omnipotent spiritual superman, but becoming at last a true human being. - Sogyal Rinpoche

Benevolence is a world of itself – a world which mankind, as yet, have hardly begun to explore. We have, as it were, only skirted along its coasts for a few leagues, without penetrating the recesses, or gathering the riches of its vast interior. - Horace Mann

Everyone feels benevolent if nothing happens to be annoying him at the moment. - C. S. Lewis

How quickly a truly benevolent act is repaid by the consciousness of having done it. - Hosea Ballou

The unaffected language of real feeling and benevolence is easily understood, and is never ridiculous. - Maria Edgeworth

Tuesday, 15 November 2011

Going far beyond the call of duty, doing more than others expect… this is what excellence is all about. And it comes from striving, maintaining the highest standards, looking after the smallest detail, and going the extra mile. Excellence means doing your very best – in everything, in every way. - Unknown

Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around. It is overwhelming to consider the continuous opportunities there are to make our love felt. - Unknown

Heaven on earth is happening simultaneously with the way our lives are showing up, right now in this moment. The trick is to be able to access this coexisting state, day in, day out, moment-by-moment, not just when in pleasant, ideal circumstances. - Unknown

Be certain that he who has betrayed thee once will
betray thee again. - Johann Caspar
Lavater

Betray a friend, and you'll often find you have
ruined yourself. - Aesop

Betrayal does that – betrays the betrayer. - Erica Jong

Each betrayal begins with trust. - Phish

It would take too long to explain the intimate
alliance of contradictions in human nature which makes love itself wear at
times the desperate shape of betrayal. And perhaps there is no possible
explanation. - Joseph Conrad

We forget cruelty and past betrayal, heedless of
where the next bright bolt may fall. - Robert
Graves

We have to distrust each other. It is our only
defence against betrayal. - Tennessee
Williams

When one does another person an injustice, in some
mysterious way it does one good to discover (or to persuade oneself) that the
injured party has also behaved badly or unfairly in some little matter or
other; it is always a relief to the conscience if one can apportion some measure
of guilt to the person one has betrayed. - Stefan
Zweig

Saturday, 12 November 2011

A true friendship always tells us that we are acceptable and accepted. This we all need to know. We have a need to be accepted not for any special quality, not for any grand achievement but simply for ourselves. - Unknown

Deep friendship develops through mutual caring and interest in each other’s well being. Friendship based on competition to show who is better can only exist on the golf course. - Unknown

As we experience acceptance in a friendship, we come to know that someone sees values in us. Being valued by someone who counts is the first step toward valuing oneself. - Unknown

A friendship that is sincere and true gives joy like nothing else will do; that is why glad hearts look up and send a prayer of thanks for faithful friends. - Unknown

The delight of honest friendship is that it can be resumed instantly regardless of the length of time it has been in abeyance; there are no preliminaries or formalities to observe, no protocol to be established. - Unknown

The miracle of friendship can be spoken without words, hearing unspoken needs, recognizing secret dreams, understanding the silent things that only true friends know. - Unknown

Wednesday, 9 November 2011

Q: Why do men's clothes have buttons on the right while women's clothes have buttons on the left?

A: When buttons were invented, they were very expensive and worn primarily by the rich. Since most people are right-handed, it is easier to push buttons on the right through holes on the left. Because wealthy women were dressed by maids, dressmakers put the buttons on the maid's right! And that's where women's buttons have remained since.

Q: Why do ships and aircraft use 'mayday' as their call for help?

A: This comes from the French word m'aidez -meaning 'help me' -- and is pronounced, approximately,’ mayday.'

Q: Why are zero scores in tennis called 'love'?

A: In France, where tennis became popular, round zero on the scoreboard looked like an egg and was called 'l'oeuf,' which is French for 'egg.' When tennis was introduced in the US, Americans (mis)pronounced it 'love.'

Q: Why is shifting responsibility to someone else called 'passing the buck'?

A: In card games, it was once customary to pass an item, called a buck, from player to player to indicate whose turn it was to deal. If a player did not wish to assume the responsibility of dealing, he would 'pass the buck' to the next player.

Q: Why do people clink their glasses before drinking a toast?

A: It used to be common for someone to try to kill an enemy by offering him a poisoned drink. To prove to a guest that a drink was safe, it became customary for a guest to pour a small amount of his drink into the glass of the host. Both men would drink it simultaneously. When a guest trusted his host, he would only touch or clink the host's glass with his own.

Q: Why are people in the public eye said to be ‘in the limelight’?

A: Invented in 1825, limelight was uses in lighthouses and theatres by burning a cylinder of lime which produced a brilliant light. In the theatrical performer 'in the limelight’ was the centre of attention.

Q: Why is someone who is feeling great ‘on cloud nine’?

A: Types of clouds are numbered according to the altitudes they attain, with nine being the highest cloud. If someone is said to be on cloud nine, that person is floating well above worldly cares.

Q: In golf, where did the term ‘Caddie’ come from?

A: When Mary, Queen of Scots went to France as a young girl, Louis, King of France, learned that she loved the Scots game ‘golf’. So he had the first course outside of Scotland built for her enjoyment. To make sure she was properly chaperoned (and guarded) while she played, Louis hired cadets from a military school to accompany her. In French, the word cadet is pronounced ‘ca-day’ and the Scots changed it to ‘caddie’.

Q: Did you ever wonder why dimes, quarters and half dollars have notches(milling), while pennies and nickels do not?

A: The US Mint began putting notches on the edges of coins containing gold and silver to discourage holders from shaving off small quantities of the precious metals. Dimes, quarters and half dollars are notched because they used to contain silver. Pennies and nickels aren’t notched because the metals they contain are not valuable enough to shave.

Tuesday, 8 November 2011

When you meet someone with good manners, you cannot know immediately if you are meeting a good person. You may not know for years, or ever. But you will know instantly that something is right about the person. - Unknown

The man who will not execute his resolutions when they are fresh upon him can have no hope from them afterwards; they will be dissipated, lost and perished in the hurry and scurry of the world, or sunk in the slough of indolence. - Unknown

The need to be focused is not because it guarantees success, but because a person only has so much time and energy to do a project well. Incidentally, it is mainly those who are focused who become most successful in life. - Unknown